It was becoming a huge pain in the butt trying to maintain both systems. The one thing I clearly didn't estimate was the impact the change had to the back end systems.

Once we started doing some test builds, it was realized that keeping both systems would not only make the rebuild process complicated and slower, it also created some issues with out to effectively present this data to the users.

Please shoot a message about your error and maybe a screenshot to [email protected].

We have been fixing some bugs and I had to recycle the caching engine a few times, so you might have just done it at the wrong moment. We've been flooded with results, so I know it's working for most

Given that the rankings changes for this year ventured into new territory (judging tournament quality), it's understandable that some tweaks occur during the year. Despite multiple people looking into the new system and attempting to find weaknesses, people find a way. It's not unreasonable to swiftly correct sooner rather than later where it could then affect the rankings in a very negative manner.

It's like software -- would you rather Microsoft not plug in any holes until the next major release of their products?

Oh come on larry, you have never been the type that even seeks out tournaments. Competitive - absolutely Seeks out tournaments to play? Not in the 12 years I've known ya!

If the tournaments themselves haven't encouraged you to play in them, no rankings system will.

Plus you act like our changes create radical differences in the rankings. They don't.

- 4 Major Edits: Versions 2 thru 5, all done at the start of their respective years so it wouldn't affect the World Championship qualification.
- 6 or 7 minor changes, counting this year, mainly to plug exploits or other issues that have been uncovered. None of these changes really had a significant impact on someone's points but are done to prevent abusing things.

We make changes to try to improve the system. Guess what? Nearly every rankings system goes thru these sort of things. F me, League of Legends replaced their entire system recently! (and holy crap was that change received negativity). Microsoft Trueskill is on version 4.3.

We discover new things, we try new things, we adapt. Keeping a system that is static -- especially one trying to cover something like pinball is a receipt that will allow it to fail. Pinbal tournaments are complex, with huge variety of formats, on a huge variety of games, with a huge variety of players. Please give me a X +Y = Z calculate that fits that requirement!

Many rankings/ratings systems do this in some fashion, since the new player is basically a unknown variable in the system.

They will still get points, it's just that their overall value to the tournament isn't as good as it previously was. My parents, who have flipped 3 games in their life shouldn't be valued the same as someone who has been playing for 10 years though. We already do this in some aspects of the formula, this is just applying it in another spot.

Please be aware that decisions are not made lightly and before they are even posted to here they have been bounced off many people internally include the country directors. Hit me up sometime at Expo and I'll talk your ear off for hours on why we've done some of the things we've done.

But like anything in pinball, some like it, some hate it and we can only take all the input and go with what we feel is right.

This is the key thing about the .1 changes and any mid year changes that have ever been done. We're not doing this screw with people

Also consider this: We are trying to maintain a system that allows competitive pinball to enjoy the use of many tournament formats that have many, many permutations. This, along with some other reasons, makes the system somewhat complex (unfortunately) and also opens the doors up for exploits. The day will most likely come where the IFPA will stop endorsing some tournaments (my personal opinion) due to their format because it's impossible to create something that covers everything fairly.

My league just went from having some value to being absolutely worthless under the current system in regards to qualifying for the SCS.

Sorry